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Friday, 11 July 2014

Dyman Associates Insurance Group of Companies -
In Part 2 of a three-part interview, T. Rowe Price's Christine Fahlund
discusses getting the most out of Social Security benefits as well as longevity
and long-term care insurance.

Christine
Fahlund, senior financial planner for T.
Rowe Price Group (TROW), retired in May after 18 years with the firm. Before
her departure, Morningstar's Christine Benz sat down with her to get her wisdom
on creating a successful retirement plan.

In Part 1 of the three-part
interview, Fahlund discussed how to assess whether you've saved enough to
retire as well as the benefits and pitfalls of working longer. In this section,
she addresses lifetime income sources, including Social Security and longevity
insurance.

Christine
Benz: You think
Social Security planning is a very important aspect of retirement planning. Can
you outline some of the things that people should be thinking about as they
look to maximize their Social Security benefits?

Christine
Fahlund: We believe
that there are a variety of ways to enhance the amount you receive from Social
Security. The preponderance of Americans are still taking it at 62. We want
them to stop for a minute and educate themselves, talk to a financial planner,
and come up with at least one strategy for them to consider other than,
"We're just going to take it at as soon as possible."

For married couples, the way to
maximize benefits is for both spouses to work until age 70, or at least to full
retirement age for one of you and 70 for the other. The higher breadwinner
should always be waiting until 70. The reason to wait until 70 is that benefit
is the amount that the surviving spouse, whether it's the husband or the wife,
is going to receive from Social Security once the first spouse dies. So, you
definitely want to maximize that because in most cases we don't know who it's
going to be or when it's going to be.

The frosting on the cake is in
addition to waiting until 70, one of you could file and suspend your payments
until 70, which would enable the other spouse to file and restrict his or her
application to spousal benefits. So, depending upon the age difference between
the two, many times, one of the spouses could receive four years' worth, from
age 66 all the way to 70, of spousal benefits, and that might end up being, for
example, $1,000 a month for four years. That's $48,000.

Now, it may not be quite possible to
wait until age 70. It may be that 68 turns out to be the number, but you're
going in the right direction. For us personally, some people would say, "I
don't know why you and your husband both waited until 70." Some of that is
an emotional decision, too. In our particular case, I felt that it would be
ideal for us to get the largest checks possible from Social Security while the
two of us are enjoying our retirement together.

Tuesday, 8 July 2014

You probably bought
your home policy years ago, then stuffed it in a file somewhere. Will it be
there for you when you need it?

Here's
how to protect yourself:

1. You'll probably
have to fight to get a big claim paid. Homeowners who suffer a loss of $30,000
or more get the most pushback from their insurers over damages, coverage and
slow payouts, ShopSmart's recent survey data shows. But the coverage of huge
losses is exactly why you buy home insurance.

Protect yourself. You
can cut your odds of a fight by doing business with an insurer that pays its
claims. The best carriers for claim-payment satisfaction are Amica, Auto-Owners
and USAA, according to the most recent Consumer Reports National Research
Center survey of 9,905 subscribers who filed homeowner claims from 2010 through
the first six months of 2013.

2. The first offer may
not be your best offer. Consider your insurance adjuster's first offer just an
opening gambit.

Protect yourself. If
you have a dispute over damages, make the adjuster go over the estimate, line
by line, with you and your contractor. Get a second opinion from an independent
contractor or multiple estimates, if necessary.

3. Your trees can
bankrupt you. Linda Paustian of La Porte discovered that after a violent
thunderstorm dropped about 40 hard maple and red oak trees on her home and
property in June 2010. State Farm paid $6,000 to remove the trees that struck
Paustian's 1895 Arts and Crafts bungalow, but nothing of an additional $6,000
that was needed for tree and debris removal and stump grinding.

Protect yourself.
Understand that a standard policy covers trees that fall on insured structures
but generally not those that land in your yard.

4. Your bank might
hold up your check. “Every check sent to
us had to be forwarded to the mortgage company so they, in turn, could write
another check to us so we could pay the contractor,” says Thomas Sloan, who
suffered $33,000 in damages when the remnants of Superstorm Sandy blew a
neighbor's oak tree onto his West Virginia home in October 2012.

Protect yourself. If
you have a mortgage, expect a settlement check made out to you and your
mortgage company. Find out how to get it promptly endorsed and deposited to
your or the lender's escrow account.

5. You may end up with
a lot of damage from a little water. James Peter told ShopSmart that his
California home had $48,000 of damage thanks to a leaking valve in his
refrigerator icemaker that wasn't discovered for months.

Protect yourself.
Check for leaks in bathrooms, kitchens and basements, and on the roof.
Periodically inspect behind appliances. Get add-on insurance coverage for sewer
backups and flood insurance for water threats from outdoors.

6. You may need lots
of cash to pay for repairs. Settlements aren't always paid quickly or in full,
so you'll need cash flow.

Protect yourself. Keep
credit card balances low or pay them off in full each month so you have ready
credit after a big loss. Build an emergency savings fund.

7. Your trusty insurer
may dump you. State Farm lived up to all of its promises to James Lipsett and
his husband, Paul LaRiviere, on their $35,000 water damage claim on their Morro
Bay, Calif., home. But less than a year later, the “good neighbor” people sent a notice of nonrenewal because of the
claim. State Farm declined to comment.

8. Your most valuable
valuables may not be covered. If that diamond ring goes missing, you're out of
luck with a standard home insurance policy. Same goes for expensive furs,
silverware or artwork.

Protect yourself.
You'll have to pay extra for a special endorsement or floater to cover the full
value of pricey possessions.

Sunday, 6 July 2014

Few personal milestones compel someone to buy life insurance
coverage like becoming a parent.

In the event of an untimely
death, lifeinsurancecan serve as a financial safety net to
ensure there’s money available to pay for everything from medical bills to a
home mortgage and future college education costs.

Many Americans have taken
steps to line up such a financial cushion.

At the end of 2012, 146.2
million individual life insurance policies were in effect, with coverage
totaling $11.2 trillion, according to the American Council of Life Insurers.

Yet the distribution model has
changed during the past few decades, and fewer Americans are relying on local
financial advisers in their community to look at their overall financial
situation and recommend a life insurance strategy, said Brian Bulakites,
national sales manager for life insurance for Henrico County-based insurance
company Genworth Financial Inc.

The Internet has enabled
consumers to shop more widely for insurance, but it might also cost them the
face-to-face advice that can be helpful, he said.

“The biggest thing we see in
our industry today is that people don’t have advisers,” he said. “You want to
find an adviser that you can build a relationship with — somebody that you can
trust.”

Here are five tips for those
looking to buy life insurance:

Learn insurance options

The overarching goal for new
parents in buying life insurance is to provide financial security in case of
the death of one or both parents.

“The first reason is for
income replacement if one of the wage earners dies prematurely,” said E.G.
Miller, an associate professor and executive director of the Risk and Insurance
Studies Center at Virginia Commonwealth University. “That means you need to
determine how much income needs to be replaced.”

“In doing that, you would also
factor in that there are some survivorship benefits for children and spouses in
Social Security, even for people that are relatively young,” he said. “That is
a base to build on, but it is not going to replace someone’s income entirely.”

However, life insurance
policies can vary widely and provide financial benefits besides a death
benefit.

“There are flexible products
these days,” said Bulakites, such as indexed universal life insurance, which
enables the policyholder not only to have a death benefit but also to
accumulate cash for use as a supplement to retirement income, to finance a
child’s education or for long-term care needs.

Life insurance policies
generally fall under two categories: Term insurance and permanent insurance,
which is often referred to as whole life or universal insurance.

With term insurance you pay a
premium for a set period, commonly 10 or 20 years, and your policy entitles you
to a specific amount of money. Unless the policyholder dies, triggering a
payout, any premiums paid are lost once the policy term ends.

In contrast, whole life
insurance policies cover insured individuals as long as they live. These
policies also function as savings vehicles. A portion of the premiums paid for
the policy are invested to provide a pool of money the policyholder can access,
tax free, while he or she is still alive.

Such policies are generally
more expensive than term life insurance, however.

Andrew Porter, a certified
public accountant in California, advises clients who are new parents to avoid
whole life insurance.

“The cheapest form of
insurance, generally speaking, for healthy, young adults is term (policies),”
Porter said.

However, Bulakites said he
would not necessarily steer younger people away from permanent insurance and
toward term. For some, permanent insurance might make more sense if their
budget can absorb it.

Set
coverage priorities

Generally, an insurance agent
will help you determine an appropriate coverage amount for the policy by
examining some of the key costs your family will have in years to come, such as
the cost of child care, education and the mortgage.

In determining how much to pay
for life insurance and the benefit, “you have to take into consideration what
your other goals are,” Bulakites said. For example, “do you have an education
fund for your kids?”

Another approach is to figure
out how much income you’re expected to earn over your lifetime.

Although it might be tempting
to think of life insurance in terms of a dollar amount, it makes more financial
sense to tie that amount to a goal, such as paying off a mortgage or college
tuition, Porter said.

“If you’re going to buy
insurance, you want to have a specific use for each policy,” he said.
Otherwise, “it opens the way for insurance agents to oversell insurance that
you may or may not need.”

Life Happens, a nonprofit
organization financed by insurance and financial companies, has an online
worksheet to estimate your insurance needs before you meet with an agent:
www.lifehappens.org/insurance-overview/life-insurance/calculate-your-needs.

Buy
a policy early

The cost of life insurance
doesn’t hinge on your credit rating, savings or assets. It’s determined by your
age and the results of a medical evaluation that’s required every time you seek
coverage.

If you’re a couple in your 20s
and healthy, you’ll pay less than when you are in your 30s and 40s.

“If you can qualify now, it’s
better to do it, versus waiting and something could change in your medical
situation and you may end up not qualifying,” said Craig DeSanto, head of life
insurance and long-term care at New York Life. “And the younger you buy, the
cheaper it is.”

A 20-year-old man who is
healthy and doesn’t smoke could be charged, on average, $32.53 a month for
$500,000 in coverage on a 20-year term life insurance policy, according to an
estimate by insurance quote portal TrustedChoice.com.

By comparison, a 50-year-old
with the same health characteristics would be charged $111.38 per month for the
same coverage.

Insure
both parents

It’s common for both parents
to work and contribute to household expenses and the costs of caring for their
children.

That’s one reason experts
recommend both spouses have life insurance, particularly if they both pitch in
to pay the mortgage.

But even in cases in which one
parent quits work to care for a young child, that parent should be insured.

“There is (a) common
misconception that a spouse who is not working does not need as much coverage
as their working spouse,” Bulakites said. “I would propose that they need the
same amount of coverage and maybe even more.”

Bulakites said his wife
maintained her life insurance when she decided to stay at home with their
children.

“I travel a lot for my job,”
he said. “If something happened to my wife, who would be home with the kids? If
I don’t have an occupation that allows me to do that … I would need to hire
someone.”